1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to a backlight unit, a display device comprising the same, and a control method thereof.
2. Discussion of the Related Art
A flat panel display device, such as a liquid crystal display (LCD), a plasma display panel (PDP), and an organic light emitting device (OLED), is being developed to replace a cathode ray tube (CRT).
The LCD may include a liquid crystal panel having a lower substrate having thin film transistors, an upper substrate, and a liquid crystal layer disposed between the substrates. Since the LCD does not emit light by itself, a backlight unit is provided behind the lower substrate to provide light.
To enable a user to selectively control the light of the backlight unit as necessary, the backlight unit includes light emitting diodes as a point light source. Referring to a unit of point light source supplied with a driving voltage as a channel and a driving unit to drive a plurality of channels as a driving module, a previously-proposed driving module includes eight channels and one driving unit to drive the eight channels. When a single set of eight channels is arranged along the width direction of the liquid crystal panel and driven, a driving module for the eight channels may not be suitable for the liquid crystal panels with various sizes. For Example, when the liquid crystal panel is enlarged in the width direction, the number of channels is increased in the width direction. However, as a previously-proposed driving module is a module for eight-multiple channels, more or fewer channels are provided for the module, resulting in an increase of the manufacturing cost of the backlight unit.